Umarov praises this region, declaring that "Krasnodar Krai, as the infidels call it, is in fact the land of our brothers, the best Muslims in this world, the land of the Adygs, the land of the Abazins, the land of the Circassians."

The region’s irreversible “Salafization” is leading to an increasing number of young men completely switching off from Russian information media and moving to an alternative space that exists in mosques and online forums.

If we accept the thesis that the era of the governor-general is now over in the North Caucasus, it would be useful to gain some idea of the range of policy instruments that are available to a top Caucasus envoy in the “post-governor-general” era.

All the signs are that Moscow will not try to aggravate the internal situation in the republic by encouraging the return of the Ingush refugees, and will likely turn a blind eye to the fact that the process has once again failed.

The views expressed on this web site are the authors' own, and don't necessarily reflect the views of Prague Watchdog,which aims to present a wide spectrum of opinion and analysis relating to events in the North Caucasus.